 Saturday Walk
With the weather forecast for
tomorrow showing clouds and drizzle while today was still
quite reasonable I decided to pull in my Sunday walk to
today, Saturday. The walk started in Heddington near
Calne, just over 30min drive from Swindon.
Arriving in Heddington I
passed the Ivy Inn, which looks like a nice pub to visit
in the summer. I parked my car near the church, changed
into my walking boots and set off west up the hill.
After passing Hill
Cottage the walk followed the  Wessex Ridgeway through the Roundway
Downs. At first glance the area looks quite unremarkable,
large fields crossed with a number of tracks. But there's
more than meets the eye: In 1643 a bloody Civil War took
place here during which Sir William Waller was defeated by
Royalist forces.
According to the walk description from the January 2005
edition of Country
Walking there
should be an observation platform somewhere, either I
missed it or it's now gone.
My next stop was when I
arrived at the Wansdyke near the A361. Under some trees
and overlooking the Wansdyke stretching west into the
distance I had a late lunch.  Refreshed I continued east, walking along
the embankment of the Wansdyke. During my walk two weeks ago I had only taken a short look at
it, this time I walked on and along it for almost two
miles.
The last part of the
walk was through Hampsley Hollow and turned out to be the
most exhausting: The bridleway I followed was churned up
quite badly and the mud stuck to my boots in large chunks
and layers. At times it felt like my boots weighed at
least 5 kilos and my walking pole had a ball of mud more
than twice the weight of the pole sticking to its tip. I
was quite relieved when I reached the lane leading back
to Heddington.
 After almost exactly three hours (and 6
miles of walking) I arrived back at my car. Clouds had
started to move in, it looked like I had made the right
decision to go for the walk today. I briefly thought
about stopping at the Ivy Inn for a pint, but then
decided to leave this for another visit during the summer
and drove home.
Trivia
- When writing this
entry the weather was: cloudy, slightly
warmer than recently but still cold
- When writing this
entry I was listening to: BBC 7
- I'm currently
reading/have just finished reading this
book/publication: BusinessWeek
- I recently visited
this website/-page: Boing Boing
- The last drink I
had was/is: Hobgoblin
Copyright © 2006, Armin
Grewe. All rights reserved. Used with permission.
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